Princess Vlei Forum AGM

The Annual General Meeting of the Princess Vlei Forum was held on September 30 this year. Approximately 35 members attended. Five of our member organisations, and the City of Cape Town, were represented.

The AGM was addressed by  Guest Speaker, Paddy Gordon, the Manager of the Table Mountain National Park. Paddy spoke about the opportunities and challenges of managing the Table Mountain National Park, illustrated with a power-point presentation. He gave us an insight on how SANParks interacts with the City, Province and National Government. TMP is characterised very high biodiversity, including  2268 species of plants, and manages  an annual budget of R12million. While it is a World Heritage Site and iconic tourist destination, the park is particularly concerned with developing its accessibility to local residents so that this heritage is available to all the people of Cape Town as well as visitors. The park is still not well used by all communities, and most visitors are tourists or white Capetonians. Nature conservation sites such as Princess Vlei can play an important role in encouraging communities to visit other natural conservation areas.

The AGM accepted the amendment to the constitution, to amend Clause 2.2 to read as follows:
2.2 Empower communities to protect this space now and in the future; and, in collaboration with the City, to take custodianship of the space; and to formulate a vision for how the space should be used.

This amendment had been proposed by the City of Cape Town, as part of the process of enabling the Princess Vlei Forum to act as a custodial community liaison organisation in the management of Princess Vlei. We are now close to signing the Memorandum of Agreement to finalise this relationship.

The election of for the Management Committee was conducted by outgoing member Bishop
Gregorowski, with assistance from Mea and Graham Lashbrooke. Members had been invited to
nominate candidates one month before the AGM. Eleven nominations were  received, and these were circulated before the AGM. This list may be downloaded here.

The 2015-­‐2016 committee members are (in alphabetical order): Ebrahim Abrahams, Philip Bam, Malcolm Campbell, Lorna Houston, Willie Leith, Emma Oliver, Bridget Pitt and Gary Stewart.

At the first meeting of the Management Committee, the following offices were allocated:

• Chairperson: Philip Bam
• Deputy Chairperson: William Leith
• Treasurer: Ebrahim Abrahams
• Secretary: Lorna Houston
• Deputy Secretary: Emma Oliver

In addition to the management committee members elected at the AGM, the committee has co-opted the following four members: Vilma Maritz; George Davis; Ayesha Prince and Elton Rinquest.

Thanks to all who attended the AGM and those who sent apologies. We look forward to an interesting and challenging year, and hope you will continue to enrich our organisation with your active participation.

download our annual report